The video has been removed, lol.
BTW the video is not fake, it's on megaupload homepage, there are also the individual advertisement videos from Puff Daddy,Alicia Keys, Will I Am, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown etc.

"Earlier today, Megaupload released a pop video featuring mainstream artists who endorse the cyberlocker service. News of the controversial Mega Song even trended on Twitter, but has now been removed from YouTube on copyright grounds by Universal Music. Kim Dotcom says that Megaupload owns everything in the video, and that the label has engaged in dirty tricks in an attempt to sabotage their successful viral campaign.

This morning we published an article on a new campaign by cyberlocker service Megaupload.

Site founder Kim Dotcom told TorrentFreak he had commissioned a song from producer Printz Board featuring huge recording artists including P Diddy, Will.i.am, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown, The Game and Mary J Blige. These and others were shouting the praises of Megaupload.

By this afternoon megaupload was trending on Twitter as news of the song spread. Little surprise interest was so high; Megaupload is described as a rogue site by the RIAA and here are some of their key labels’ artists promoting the service in the most powerful way possible – through a song.

And then, just a little while ago, the music stopped. Visitors to YouTube hoping to listen to the Mega Song were met with the following message.

Mega Song Blocked

TorrentFreak immediately contacted Kim to find out what was happening.

So did Universal have any right at all to issue YouTube with a takedown notice? Uncleared samples, anything?

“Mega owns everything in this video. And we have signed agreements with every featured artist for this campaign,” Kim told TorrentFreak.

“UMG did something illegal and unfair by reporting Mega’s content to be infringing. They had no right to do that. We reserve our rights to take legal action. But we’d like to give them the opportunity to apologize.”

“UMG is such a rogue label,” Kim added, wholly appreciating the irony.

A few minutes after this exchange Kim contacted us with good news. After filing a YouTube copyright takedown dispute, the video was reinstated. But alas, just seconds later, it was taken down again.

“We filed a dispute, the video came back online and now it’s blocked again by UMG and the automated YouTube system has threatened to block our account for repeat infringement,” Kim explained.

TorrentFreak spoke with Corynne McSherry, Intellectual Property Director at EFF, who says this type of copyright abuse is nothing new.

“This appears to be yet another example of the kind of takedown abuse we’ve seen under existing law — and another reason why Congress should soundly reject the broad new powers contemplated in the Internet Blacklist Bills, aka SOPA/PIPA.

“If IP rightholders can’t be trusted to use the tools already at their disposal — and they can’t — we shouldn’t be giving them new ways to stifle online speech and creativity,” McSherry concludes.

Sherwin Siy, Deputy Legal Director at Public Knowledge, worries that this type of sweeping power would only be augmented with the arrival of the SOPA anti-piracy bill in the US.

“If UMG took down a video it has no rights to, then what we have here is exactly the sort of abuse that careless, overzealous, or malicious copyright holders can create by abusing a takedown law,” he told us.

“What makes this even worse is that UMG, among others, is pushing to expand its power to shut people down by fiat–SOPA lets rightsholders de-fund entire websites with the same sort of non-reviewed demand that removed this video,” he concludes.

Megaupload’s Kim Dotcom informs us that he has now submitted an international counter notification to YouTube, informing them that UMG has no rights to anything in the video and that the label abused the YouTube takedown system to sabotage the company’s business.

“It’s ridiculous how UMG is abusing their intervention powers in YouTube’s system to stop our legitimate campaign. They are willfully sabotaging this viral campaign. They own no rights to this content,” Kim insists.

“What UMG is doing is illegal. And those are the people who are calling Mega rogue? Insanity!”

Streisand Effect, here we come again.

Update: “The fact that this expression could be silenced by a major label — without any apparent infringement — should be seriously troubling to anyone who cares about artists’ speech rights,” says Casey Rae-Hunter, Deputy Director, Future of Music Coalition. “If this can happen to Snoop Dogg and others, it can happen to anyone.”

The video has been removed, lol.
BTW the video is not fake, it's on megaupload homepage, there are also the individual advertisement videos from Puff Daddy,Alicia Keys, Will I Am, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown etc.

If ANY of those artists are signed to UMG that gives UMG the right to license their works - period. And artist from label A can't appear on an artist from label B's album without clearance from label A.

Even if Megaupload paid all those artists, without clearance from all the labels of the artists involved they can't use the song in public.

No record company in their right mind is going to give Megaupload clearance for anything.

If Kim whatshisname resided in the US that would constitute a criminal (not civil) offense and he could get another "vacation" at state expense.

If ANY of those artists are signed to UMG that gives UMG the right to license their works - period. And artist from label A can't appear on an artist from label B's album without clearance from label A.

Even if Megaupload paid all those artists, without clearance from all the labels of the artists involved they can't use the song in public.

No record company in their right mind is going to give Megaupload clearance for anything.

If Kim whatshisname resided in the US that would constitute a criminal (not civil) offense and he could get another "vacation" at state expense.

Too bad, he could stand to lose some of that flab.

so shouldnt Universal sue its artists who were in the video for breach of contract?

so shouldnt Universal sue its artists who were in the video for breach of contract?

I AM NOT DEFENDING MEGAUPLOAD EITHER.

I don't think it works that way. AFAIK there's nothing in a contract to say who you record with, just who puts it out, but I'd really have to run it by a lawyer to be certain.

I'm sure UMG isn't happy with them though.

For example there's a lot of archived material by acts like Hendrix and The Stones that has never been released due to contractual difficulties, and in the '60s and '70s artists like Dylan and Mike Bloomfield made many pseudonymous appearances on other artist's albums on other labels where they didn't use their real names for contractual reasons. (Bloomfield = Makel Blumenfeld, Dylan=Blind Boy Grunt, etc.) It's the "product name" attached to the contract.

If those UMG stars had used pseudonyms there would be no problem - but that would kinda diminish the point, wouldn't it?

Every contract is different, but if you wanted to duet with an artist on a different label for example, most times you have to have permission from both labels.
Recording contracts are generally exclusive.
Also, most labels look very dimly on artists damaging their own record sales, or collaborating with any competing interest.
In the end, everyone is in it together and we all depend on each other for the project to successfully make money. So, you can't say you wont appear on a particular chat show, unless you are selling bucket loads of records. I once knew a band who refused to accept a booking from their agent for a festival. For a laugh the band turned up and played (impromptu) anyway. Of course the agent didn't get his percentage fee. So the agent dropped the band.

Major Label artists are usually bound to "Name and Likeness" approvals from the label (for reasons such as these and to protect their investment), seems to me they are well within their rights if they were not consulted.

so shouldnt Universal sue its artists who were in the video for breach of contract?

I AM NOT DEFENDING MEGAUPLOAD EITHER.

they are most likely within their rights to do BOTH, it's not either/or. it is a rare case where an artist will have complete control over their name in likeness, and nothing the artist does can supersede any other per-existing agreement. if mr.mega truly believes he is within his rights legally, shouldn't he bring the lawsuit? let's see how that goes... I have a feeling the lawyers, execs, managers, etc of universal and those artists are working overtime this weekend. grab the popcorn.

they are most likely within their rights to do BOTH, it's not either/or. it is a rare case where an artist will have complete control over their name in likeness, and nothing the artist does can supersede any other per-existing agreement. if mr.mega truly believes he is within his rights legally, shouldn't he bring the lawsuit? let's see how that goes... I have a feeling the lawyers, execs, managers, etc of universal and those artists are working overtime this weekend. grab the popcorn.

it will be interesting to see- I know if I was an A&R person managing any of those artists accounts I would be apoplectic. And I would make sure everyone in the chain of command above was aware of it too.

But I guess Elvis Costello got away with telling people not to buy his collection this week too though....

it will be interesting to see- I know if I was an A&R person managing any of those artists accounts I would be apoplectic. And I would make sure everyone in the chain of command above was aware of it too.

Does no one else think some of the shots in that video look a little bit suspect? Like the lips aren't quite in sync with the vocals? Almost as if this was put together with some clever video editing techniques? Hmmm.....

Doesn't no one else think some of the shots in that video look a little bit suspect? Like the lips aren't quite in sync with the vocals? Almost as if this was put together with some clever video editing techniques? Hmmm.....

The misunderstanding here is by Megaupload. What they don't understand is that it doesn't matter if they paid for the recordings and the video. If an artist/act signs a recording contract with a record label, everything that artist/act does during the period of that contract belongs to that label regardless of who paid for it and the label has the right to say if it gets released or shelved. The only "exception" to this is a person like George Clinton who signs contracts for different acts which he leads with different labels, but the legal language to pull this off is very, very tricky and you can bet cash money that none of the artists involved here have any such contracts. (AFAIK Clinton was able to do it because his only relationship under his own name with the labels was as a freelance producer/manager - the actual contracts were under the name of the acts specifically.)